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Well, it looks like at least one judge in North Carolina must be a long-lost relative of Gomer and Goober Pyle. “Surprise, surprise, surprise!”

Seems as if the town of Brasstown, NC, has an . . . um, unique New Year’s tradition. Along with the bear stew and musket shooting, each year they have a “possum drop” on New Year’s Eve.

What’s a “possum drop”, you ask? In Brasstown’s “possum drop”, the opossum isn’t actually dropped at all. Instead, an opossum is humanely captured during hunting season. It’s kept caged fed and caged until New Year’s Eve. On New Year’s Eve, the opossum is suspended in its cage. At midnight, the cage is lowered as part of the town’s New Year’s Eve festivities.

Think a low-tech version of the Times’ Square New Year’s Eve apple drop – Appalachian Style. The opossum is afterwards released back into the wild.

The person who captured the opossum even gets a special permit from the NC Wildlife Resources Commission (WRC). That permit allowed them to display the opossum at his country store between capture and release vice killing it.

Well, that’s the way it used to work. One less dead opossum during hunting season, who gets well fed and and cared for and then released. Everybody’s happy, and no harm – right?

Well that was the case for 20 years or thereabouts. Then PETA got involved.

Predictably, PETA saw all of this as “cruel treatment” of the opossum. So they took the state to court. Their argument? The retention of the opossum captured during hunting season was unlawful.

“Hunters must afford wild animals the same right Patrick Henry yearned for,” Senior Administrative Law Judge Fred Morrison Jr. wrote in his order. “’Give me liberty, or give me death!’”

That’s right, folks – the moron posing as a judge actually equated the opossum and Patrick Henry in his “learned opinion”. Geez.

The NC WRC is presently deciding whether or not to appeal Morrison’s decision. Otherwise, Morrison’s moronic opinion stipulates that the opossum must be released within 30 days.

For common sense’s sake, I certainly hope the WRC appeals this act of judicial idiocy. I hope the appeals court has the common sense to overturn Morrison. And I also hope the appeals court orders PETA to pay the state’s legal costs incurred in fighting this latest bit of PETA asininity.

Comments (9)

Brasstown is right down the road from me, the possum drop has been good clean fun for people for many years and has made it to prime time a few times. It kills me that these PETA people who most likely have never even attended can argue mistreatment. Clay Logan the owner of the Store that has held his event has been fighting this for three years now. Next they will say the the Phil the ground hog can no longer be held hostage to see his shadow.

Better solution: capture a PETA twit for illegal parking, making too much noise, or staring at people or something, keep it in jail, feed it meat for a month (no vegs, none at all), then put it in a car on a crane on New Year’s Eve and drop the car — WAY OUTSIDE OF TOWN. And tell it to not ever come back.

So by extension, the death penalty for prisoners who have earned it is better than life without parole, right? Somehow I don’t think the judge (or PETA) would agree, but it’s the logical conclusion since they’re the ones who made the equation.

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We are all military combat veterans and we write primarily from that perspective. Everyone who writes here has a Combat Infantry Badge, a Combat Medic Badge, a Combat Action Badge or a Combat Action Ribbon. We write about issues that matter to combat veterans..read more »